Currently, we are at a stage in the evolution of gaming where the jump from the current generation to the next is just a matter of time – holiday 2013, to be precise. However, with days passing by, it’s only a matter of time before the future becomes the past. But where does that leave the industry, and more importantly, us, the nearby future? It seems like now there’s an answer to that.
Recently, Thatgamecompany co-founder Jenova Chen spoke with [a]list daily, where he talked about the evolution of the gaming industry and the prospects of upcoming developers to seek out brand new ideas for fans. For those who are not aware, Thatgamecompany is responsible for the popular indie title Journey for PlayStation 3 – which won several "game of the year" awards.
On asked about the greatest opportunity and challenge ahead for game designers in the future, Chen stated: “I like to look at business through emotion. Right now the game industry is still at a very young phase. There is a lot of space for people to go deeper on emotion. We actually went quite deep on the feeling of action and adventure. The feeling of killing someone used to be some pixel changed color, now it's some guy's guts are falling out. A lot of other emotions can go a lot deeper, and that will result in each genre becoming more and more sophisticated. Emotion can go wider.”
“The new emotion that was not possible in the past should be possible in the future. What is the equivalent in a video game of a romantic film? A documentary? A drama? What is a family video game? There are family games, but they are mostly for the kids. What is the equivalent of a Pixar film in the video game industry, where adults and kids can have fun together? They don't exist right now. They are all blue ocean, and they are huge markets.”
On the topic of new upcoming technologies and their impact on game design, Chen stated that he’s excited about the fact that “we can capture realistic humans and lighting and their performance,” although the technology is yet to be perfected as of now.
“In the end, when you create emotions you have a wide range of media you can use in games. For example, animation or music. One of the strongest mediums that will evoke a strong response is performance is actually watching a human have real feelings. Next to performance, the strongest is music, which is why we spend so much time on music for our games. I'm looking forward to the future where directing a game is very much like directing a movie. You bring in actors, you work with them, you get the best performance out of them. I'm looking forward to that future, but right now I can't do it, I'm not even going to bother trying,” he added.
Journey launched exclusively for PlayStation 3 back in March last year.
